Too much data, too little time

Companies have tons of data. How do executives know what data is valuable, and frankly, what to do with that data. Well, it all depends on what type of data it is, and what's the objective. Typically, customer and product performance data are priceless, especially when you can figure out what customers respond to in terms of business drivers, and what will make them convert, or buy. That, is priceless.

This does not mean other data is not valuable. In fact, operational information such as procedural guidelines can yield key information that are easily overlooked. Here's what I mean. Do you know what happens from the time someone in sales contacts a lead, to the time the customer calls the company's post-sales support? Information such as time durations, roles and responsibility and departments involved are especially helpful.

Why is this helpful, one might ask. By seeing the process from beginning to end, one understands the underlying issues and their root cause. For example, I mapped out an Internet company's customer process, from the first sales call to the customer's tech support call. Then, came the aha moment. Because the company lacked a centralized customer data solution, each department kept its own version of customer information. Which meant that the poor customer was receiving calls from different departments asking for the same information, sometimes within the same day.

What did this mean for the company? This particular company had much to gain by implementing a centralized customer data storage system accessible to all the departments. Not to mention a much better customer experience for the customer. In fact, I would venture to say that most credit card and retail companies can profit from a centralized customer data storage solution. After all, how many times do you have to repeat the same information to different departments of the same company in one call? More than one, right?

Bottom line: Not all data are created equal, and their usefulness depend on the company's objective. But, don't overlook the procedural data, because it very well may contain the root cause to the issue outlined in the data, not to mention savings for your company.

Its all in the numbers

With the current economical climate, most companies are scaling back on their marketing operations to weather the storm. Although this may seem logical, my questions to these companies would be as follows:

• Are you reducing your marketing budget strategically?
• Do you know which customers are contribute the most and the least to your company's profitability?
• Do you know which part of the marketing program to downsize?
  

These questions are illustrative to understand the reasons behind the decisions. 80% of the company's profits are typically generated by its top 20% of customers. This is the well-known aspect of the 80:20 principle. However, here's the second part of that famous principle: 50% of the company's profits are eaten away by the bottom 30% of its customers.

What does that mean? Unless you know what your customers mean to you in terms of profitability, you would not know which one to keep or toss, not to mention allocate your resources accordingly especially in times of economic downturn. Where's all this information coming from? Your most valuable asset: customer and performance data. With some purposeful digging, you can find out who should you focus your resources on, not to mention who you should cater to in terms of your products. For example, after examining a company's marketing efforts and their dollars generated, I realized that the most taxing efforts realized the least returns. So we balanced things out according to their perceived rewards.

Bottom line: Your marketing budget should be strategically driven by insights from your data.